As such, Christie didn’t want to just defeat Buono…

…he wanted to beat her badly and with a large coalition.

Christie — a Republican — was looking to portray himself as a bipartisan candidate who could appeal to a majority of Americans. He asked Buono’s fellow New Jersey Democrats to pledge their allegiance to him.

New Jersey politics being New Jersey politics, it was expected that Christie would not take this well.

And that Sokolich might expect reprisals from the Christie administration.

In mid-September 2013, two access lanes to the George Washington Bridge — which connects New Jersey and New York — were unexpectedly shut down for a week.

The George Washington Bridge is considered by the Port Authority to be the busiest bridge in the world. The partial closure created massive gridlock for a week. A vital artery had been severed and it was chaos.